Figs, olives and apples

Our fig trees are laden with masses of luscious ripe figs. When I eat the fruit, straight from the tree, it is usually warm and sun baked. But this morning we had high cloud again, and the fruit was cool. Thru the kitchen window we hear the starlings feasting with delight, who used to nest in the gutters, next to our insulated metal roof. The bird on the nest was often standing on the outer edge, beak a gape. And delighted to go off duty, and have a quick bathe in the pond. Or at least to catch a quick drink, before dashing off shrieking - Food, Food, Food, they always want more Food!!! There are also a crowd of red faced mouse birds - with their long tails, and jaunty little crests. But too shy, and gone, before the camera was out. 

Figs

The apple trees are looking good. That is, lots of healthy green foliage. Even the ratty old stubs, have been grateful for food and water, and sent out lots of fresh branches. So will have to prune carefully to rejuvenate the old trees we inherited. We have. Five? apples on three trees.

First granadilla of this season

Somewhat mystified why the plums are now sulking. Leaves yes. But no fruit. Think we forgot to feed them. And I thought they didn't need pruning every year?

Australian brush cherry

Then the Australian brush cherry. Again inherited. Huge trees. Bit like cypress leylandii. The Ungardener has already sawed the top off once. In many, huge chunks. But we will have to do it again. Glad it hides the neighbours garage, but that is only the ONE storey, while the trees are at least two storeys high. They do produce an amazing amount of fruit. Which lies on the driveway, so the birds prefer the figs, or grapes thank you. Love to pick the new leaves, which have a wonderful burgundy colour. Good with deep red roses.

Winter's glow

The first two olives, planted as street trees, have grown huge. Need to be pruned. Lecchino variety, but no olives yet. The newest 8, planted down the driveway. Frantoia - have already got FRUIT. And they are just little teenage saplings! Both varieties chosen to grow quickly, but they are for oil, rather than eating, so we are told. Olives are obliging trees, which can be pruned to fit the shape in your mind's eye.

First OLIVES!!

Citrus trees at the Mediterranean Sun Circle. Mr Washington has his first orange. Just the one. Still bright lime green, and the size of a golf ball.

Photos and written 

by Diana of  Elephant's Eye 

Dozen for Diana 7 - Restios

Since Piet  Oudolf, gardeners have learnt to see swathes of various grasses as desirable. Things of beauty. No longer weeds=OUT. Reeds and grasses have morphed into something we seek out. To plant in our garden, and enjoy.

(This post was originally published on the 9th November last year)

If you have been following Dozen for Diana, so far I have chosen a focal point/informal hedge, a small tree, a variegated groundcover, some colourful groundcover daisies, a white arum and a white pelargonium - for my imaginary smallish, townhouse/courtyard garden. 

These plants are happy with the long hot summer and wet winter of a Mediterranean climate. Double points if they are from South Africa.

Third, got to have something special –

beautiful foliage, 

flowers to pick,

fragrance,

wildlife friendly,

edible,

pioneer.

Thatching reed

These are our indigenous reeds. If you see a  Cape_Dutch house, with its graceful gable and thatched roof – that thatch is Elegia tectorum. Or insignis. Tectorum means roof. (You may have met this plant as Chondropetalum, but all those species have recently been moved into Elegia.) The name Elegia is presumed to come from the Greek elegeia, a song of lamentation, and may be a reference to the rustling sound of the papery sheaths and bracts in the breeze. – from PlantZafrica .

An architectural focal plant, growing in a clump, arching out gracefully, and they get LARGE, so allow space. 1.5 metres high, and 2 or 3 metres across! As the stems grow the tips have a sharply pointed bract, so it is not suitable if you have toddlers running around. This, is a grownup’s plant.

Olifantsriet

When you drive across country, the proteas (especially if they are flowering) and drifts of restios in seeps and low damp patches – will tell you that you are back in fynbos. The ericas and bulbs usually require you to stop, and walk, if you want to see them.

My favourite is Elegia capensis, which produces its whorls of leaves, exactly like the Northern hemisphere Equisetum. A particularly unusual and beautiful way of growth! (Leonotis, Lion’s Ear is the only other plant like this, that I can think of.)

Because most species grow in damp places, in the garden, they will need some water when newly planted. And they are used to howling South-Easters, so they want space and fresh air, thank you.

Calopsis, bergbamboes on the left, with Chocolat, and dwarf papyrus on the right

The various species range in size from this (going to be huge) Bergbamboes  (translates as mountain bamboo. Common name, it is NOT related to bamboo!) The name Calopsis is derived from Kalos meaning beautiful and opsis meaning sight. The specific name paniculata means a tuft. - from PlantZafrica .

Choose your plant carefully, as you cannot prune it back. It is the size it is, basta. If you cut into the stems, they will die, and the plant will fade away. The thatchers harvest carefully, once a year, and taking stems that are already a full year old. Allowing the next year’s supply of  thatch to grow thru undisturbed by cutting above the new growth.

Olifantsriet at bridge

In the garden you simply tidy away the odd dead stem. Living within a protected environment in the centre of the clump are our Table Mountain cockroaches Aptera fusca. No, these are not your common kitchen cockroaches. They live outside, in the garden, on bits of dead plants. On a winter afternoon a few mothers get together, with all their little people, very much like a kindergarten – and they all soak up the sun. Not sure if the few I have seen here, came with us in pot plants from Camps Bay, where we lived on the mountain slope, 3 houses away from Table Mountain nature reserve. They will squeak at you, if you bother them! 

If you can choose only one grass/reed, which would it be? I have been greeted with gnashing teeth and wails of anguish, when I say JUST ONE! (But Frances will choose her world famous Muhly?) It is a game, or an exercise. Play around, or focus your mind. That shrub has died - some waving grass would be good? Thunk about it? Do leave a comment and share your one and only ... 

Photos and written 

by Diana of  Elephant's Eye 

Dragonflies and Chocolat

Chocolat was off to investigate, with me in hot pursuit, in case someone needs defending. I was woken early, a few days ago. Little voice saying - Is anyone there? Help! Save me! Fall out of bed into the garden, to find Chocolat looking irritably at the bulrushes. I can't see anything untoward. What can you see? And then I see next door's little ginger kitten, cowering in absolute terror in the few inches of water around the bull rushes. While Chocolat stomps around grumbling - That bleddie cat is In My GARDEN!!!

No wonder my lemon verbena looks Sat Upon

Then the Ungardener was up. Coaxed the kitten out and posted him back next door. Whereupon he changed into another cat, regaining his confidence and raising himself to his full height and sparkle. How do? You're nice to me! Can I come home with you??! Then he suddenly realised he was Home, and dropped, belly to the ground, and shot off into his safe kitchen.

When hot, find a shady place, and put your feet up …

So what is that small noise. Frantic flapping. Follow that cat. It is a Blue Emperor dragonfly, lying on the water flailing his wings. I am guessing it was newly hatched, and pumping up his never been unfolded before wings. So I fished him out of the water, perched him on a nearby pelargonium. Distracted the cat from his prior claim. Sadly, later in the day, the Ungardener found a dead dragonfly lying in the water. Same one? Old or injured, rather than frail newborn??


(Remember this post from September? Young dragonfly going to fly)

Blue Emperor, see the blurred wing flapping madly

When I worked in Zurich, I used to walk to work via the bridge over the Limmat river. One morning as I approached the water I heard frantic, fighting with his last breath for his life, flapping. From the bridge looking down into the water, I saw a pigeon. Just one of those 'flying rats' . Not being a water bird, the more he flapped the wetter, more sodden and heavy he got. And slowly, patiently, languidly circling, not much farther above him. Were the seagulls. Being Swiss, they have all had their heads dipped in good Lindt chocolate. Their menace, just waiting until the pigeon is too weak to fight any more. Those minutes walking across the bridge, time stood still in horror. Living thru Hitchcock's The Birds.

But pigeons are a problem in the city. Because the people, who are the real problem, leave lots of food out. So on another morning early. The sharpshooters were out, dressed in their regulation camouflage.

Red-veined dropwing

And on one of these lovely cool fresh mornings, with high cloud cover, when the insects are displaying themselves, while waiting patiently for the sun to come thru. This red-veined dropwing dragonfly - was one of the last pictures our dying, dying, now officially dead, camera took.







Photos and written by Diana of  Elephant's Eye 










To a new reader. This blog is hosted at Blotanical. It is a garden blog. We garden for wildlife, and this is my weekly wildlife post. Depending on how you have chosen to read this post, you may need to click thru to the blog to see the poll on the sidebar. Question 2 has had 20 votes - THANK YOU ALL. In February I will post feedback on comments, picks and this poll.

January flowers in our garden

Just before our camera threw up its hands, and said - Right I'm off - and gave up the ghost …

Abelia and Adam-ant

We had a morning with the tail end of sea fog rolling in from Langebaan lagoon, and rising when it hits our mountains, to give us a dense cover of low cloud. One grateful reason why, altho it gets HOT in Porterville, it doesn't get as hot as it does, over the mountain, and inland to the Karoo. Semi-desert. And the reason why fynbos with proteas and restios flourishes in lower temperatures and moister air, up there ON the mountain. Perfect light for taking photos, while the camera was still up for it.

Red and rose pelargoniums

January is hot. Mid thirties. Pushing 40C. And we have had one whole millimetre of rain so far this month. Thru the night, so the plants got to sleep in moist coolth for once. Grateful to be able to look on the pond. My water lilies have stopped sulking, since we, that is the Ungardener, has cleared most of the invasive Kariba weed. Makes good mulch. The flowers keep coming. The water lily is another of those archetypal plants, that everyone recognises. A simple line drawing, circular leaves, in radiating circles. With those glorious flowers rising at the centre of the circles.

Deluverly cool wet water

We have heavy clay soil, which is fertile. But in summer it goes like concrete. Try to dig with a trowel, and it does a convincing imitation of spaghetti. Cooked and bending. Or raw and snapped in half. What is amazing, is that even now in high summer, mole rats manage to tunnel along, just below the surface. Leaving a ridge of friable soil. No problem.

January 2010 in flower at Elephant's Eye
From the top left - basil, salmon pelargonium, Tulbaghia, Pride of India
White pelargonium, Elizabeth of Glamis rose, Bulbine
Blue, then red sage, red pelargonium
Karoo rose, white plumbago, Abelia, Rose pelargonium, Pickerel weed
Brick red kalanchoe, Dianthus allwoodii, Dietes, lavender, Royal Cape plumbago

On 23rd December I brought you Christmas flowers in our garden. And I aim to do a collage each month. I may blend pictures from different years, but they will all be from that month, and in my garden. This will remind me what should be, is usually, in flower, now. To encourage a disheartened gardener, who is seeing the bare concrete, uh clay. The plants which are just resting now …

Photos and written by Diana of  Elephant's Eye 

Kgalagadi 3

The Ungardener has always dreamt of seeing the famous lions of the Kgalagadi. So in June 2008 that was our mission. They are larger than lions elsewhere, as they may cover 12 kilometres at night hunting. The mane remains more impressive, as grassland is kinder to the clothes than bushveld. Because they are predators they are hard to see. But we clicked into a friendly pattern of sharing with approaching cars. So we were told – at the next waterhole there are two lions resting in the shade.

Lions

And here, the car pulling out, told us, there is a leopard sleeping in the trees. So we parked quietly, and had our lunch there, while she napped.

Leopard 

Putting her head up, as we drove away later.

Leopard 

We were also delighted to see an African Wild Cat, as they are usually nocturnal. Long leggedy beastie hunting thru the long grass, and just disappeared out of our picture. Spent time watching bat eared foxes hunting for bugs, with their heads and those ears held low to the ground.

Sunset

We grew up saying meerkats, but in ‘English’ they are suricates. This particularly glossy golden coat however belongs to the yellow mongoose. Same shape and habits, but a better wardrobe.

Yellow mongoose

Kgalagadi  =  salt pans, also means that the water is brack, ‘slightly’ salty. It is not contaminated, and is safe to drink (depending on your constitution … They renamed two waterholes. Originally Little S### Kleinskrij and Big S### Grootskrij - as a warning to farmers travelling with their herds.) I quite enjoyed salty tea, for a change. And I drink a lot of tea. But the poor Ungardener was desperately ill. Spent one day in camp recovering. And then I drove almost all the way home, from Union’s End, via Upington. This long, straight, road, home.

Hantam road home

(Did you miss the beginning? Sociable weavers, Kgalagadi 1 and  Kgalagadi 2

Photos by Jurg and Diana, 
written by Diana of  Elephant's Eye 

To a new reader

This blog is hosted at Blotanical. It is a garden blog.

On Fridays I wander off topic. Travelling, ranting, blogging.

Depending on how you have chosen to read this post, 

you may need to click thru to the blog to see the poll on the sidebar. 

Question 3 has had 20 votes - THANK YOU ALL.

In February I will post feedback on comments, picks and this poll.

Dozen for Diana 6 – Summer snowflake

Pelargoniums, just pelargoniums …

(This was first published on 2nd October last year)

Just for fun, today I collected some of my pelargoniums together, and I do have more. The harvester termites favourite with delicately incised tiny leaves (coming in a later post). Ivy leaved pelargoniums – for hanging baskets and window boxes.

If you have been following Dozen for Diana, so far I have chosen a focal point/informal hedge, a small tree, a variegated groundcover, some colourful groundcover daisies and a white arum - for my imaginary smallish, townhouse/courtyard garden. 

Double points if they are from South Africa. These plants are happy with the long hot summer and wet winter of a Mediterranean climate.

Third, got to have something special –

beautiful foliage,

flowers to pick,

fragrance,

wildlife friendly,

edible,

pioneer.

For my one and only – I choose this white one, which having started as a ratty gnarled piece from my mother’s garden, now towers up to shoulder height. Keep trimming them back, spread the cuttings around, pass them on to your friends. And the flowers have obliging long stems for your vase.

Course Valentine is the most beautiful, with long heart shaped dark leaves, and the flowers shimmer like mother-of-pearl in the sunlight. She prefers afternoon shade and a little more water.

Scented pelargoniums

1. The very largest leaves are tomentosum which they say prefers shade (nah I’ll take gentle sun as well thanks). This is one I have had to learn to love. That minty fragrance is unexpected and fierce, far fiercer than any mere culinary mint. But with delicate fragile white flowers floating above the leaves, it sprawls and soars in exuberance. Saw it planted in a Grecian urn at an open garden in Elgin, using a common pelargonium to shade tomentosum’s leaves, giving two layers of flower colour. (Paint your own picture with your choice of contrasting colour).
2. The sharply pointed leaves carry a sweet citrus scent. Love that smell. And smallish pink and white flowers, as so many species pelargoniums do.
3. There is “rose” scented and quercifolium with “oak” shaped leaves.
4. Nutmeg has small grey-green kidney/gingko shaped leaves and small white flowers. This one is low growing and compact, ideal for containers.
5. A modern one with variegated leaves, giving colour interest even when not carrying salmony pink flowers.
6. And each year brings more modern garden hybrids of the zonal pelargoniums. Basically every colour and combination you can think of, except blue and yellow! If you have hardy pelargoniums, you will know that brushing against their leaves releases the fragrance.

Seen ‘em all? No, there are also succulent pelargoniums, with fleshy stems and delicate flowers.

A pelargonium has a face, left and right symmetry, a pansy or an orchid, whichever you prefer? Whereas a geranium has radial symmetry like any daisy. This is Geranium incanum, South Africa’s only true geranium – a piece of sky, fallen to the ground as a summer snowflake. This is a gift from nature, coming up amongst the gravel on our driveway. It is promised to be a good, low groundcover and the flowers come up charmingly, in pairs! Would never grow in the last garden, so I am delighted!

If you can choose only one flowering perennial, what would it be? I have been greeted with gnashing teeth and wails of anguish, when I say JUST ONE! It is a game, or an exercise. Play around, or focus your mind. That shrub has died - what are you going to replace it with? Thunk about it? Do leave a comment and share your one and only ... 

Photos and written by Diana of  Elephant's Eye 

Rain spiders

To all the EWWW Spiders! Be aware, there are spiders here. But if you persevere, we will end in the garden. The Foliage (and roses) garden.


This post is dedicated to Our Friend Ben's Chocolate and my legacy from Sir Hans Sloane.



There are two forms of wildlife that make me shriek out loud. I have a totally irrational horror of grasshoppers, locusts. I will cross the road to avoid one, and wail pitifully for the Ungardener to save me, if I can see one near me when I am gardening. They don't bite. They don't hurt. But what if it would jump ON me. I don't think my heart would go on beating.



Yes, and the second would be these rain spiders INside. I am OK if they are outside. We had one on the sliding glass patio doors. High up, towards the centre, near the opening. That evening I slid the doors open to tell M'sieu Chocolat the kitchen is about to close - Final Orders?! And something, large, walked very delicately, across my forehead. Well, my fringe, over my hair. As I drew breath to scream, I realised it was 'just' that rain spider. Disturbed in her evening hunting, by me, opening the door.

Rain spider, thru the glass, from underneath

With the legs folded up, this spider is about the size of a child's fist. With eight legs spread wide, it is about the same size as my hand, with (shame, only) five fingers spread wide. So they are quite disconcerting, when you suddenly notice this dark shape. Especially if it is moving. Fast. Help! Ungardener!

Rain spider, as you usually see her, from the the top

'Nocturnal, wandering hunters that live in vegetation but often come indoors to hunt insects attracted to lights.' from Spiderwatch in Southern Africa, by Astri and John Leroy. 'Rain' spiders, because they don't like to get wet, understandably, and so they shelter in our house! More info at Biodiversityexplorer    

Rain spider, folded up. I think there is a leg missing

In summer, with temperatures in the high thirties, and pushing 40C - even the spiders prefer to spend the hottest part of the day on the verandah. Where it is dim and cool. Swirling ice cubes in a tall glass of something cool. (That is where ice belongs, in cubes, in a tall glass - or else in Antarctica!)

Biscuit spider. Name unknown

High up, tucked into the angle of the wall and the wood panelled ceiling of the verandah was this 'biscuit'. Which, when I got closer turned into a rather lovely spider. Biscuit coloured and shaped. Just, it has got a head, and eight legs. So, not your average biscuit. And it is only the size of my little finger nail. Name unknown. And she has sat there. Like that. Four front legs in a tidy bouquet. For the last two days, since I first saw her. Makes my LEGS ache!

January 2008

January 2010

Back to the garden. In January 2008 I caught this lovely view of the pink roses - Spring Promise - with glaucous blue foliage. Two years later, see how the little tree - Dais cotonifolia has grown. And there are the promised pink pompoms for Christmas. Seems to be a thirsty little tree, but it is in the rose garden, and gets watered each week. The wildeals - Artemisia afra, which smells delicious, like liquorice, has grown into a huge shrub. Which I will have to cut back in March, before the winter rain makes it even bigger. Melianthus major, after I read of it being cut back by frost each year in the North, has also been pruned hard. Just the little, younger branches left. And behind that Dusty Miller hedge, yes there are rose bushes! We, the roses and I, are waiting for March, rain, and the autumn flush.

Photos by Jurg and Diana, 
written by Diana of  Elephant's Eye 

Dozen for Diana 5 – Arum Lily

Arum – Zantedeschia aethiopica - Calla

(first published on 28th September, when it was flowering ...)

You are in my imaginary smallish, townhouse/courtyard garden. If you have been following Dozen for Diana, so far I have chosen a focal point/informal hedge, a small tree, a variegated groundcover and some colourful groundcover daisies. These plants are happy with the long hot summer and wet winter of a Mediterranean climate. Double points if they are from South Africa.

Third, got to have something special –

beautiful foliage,

flowers to pick,

fragrance,

wildlife friendly,

edible,

pioneer.

Here is an open invitation to Northern hemisphere gardeners
asking, what shall I post about in winter.

To all gardeners ...

Look back to when you first moved to your new garden,

or look across to your new neighbour.

If you had known then, what you know now,

what would have been the first bulb you planted?

The one you LOVE, happy in your soil and climate?

No time limit on this. Please leave a comment when you have chosen!

As a child, I took this beloved plant from the wild. Now, I know wild flowers are protected. And why? So that your children and grandchildren will still be able to see wild flowers. To allow the web of life which that plant supports to survive and flourish. So often we still do not even know, what creatures may be dependent on just that plant for their life. For instance, there is a tiny frog, who lives in these white flowers, they say. I do admit I have never seen one yet ...

from www.plantzafrica.com

Zantedeschia is named after Professor Zantedeschi, probably Giovanni Zantedeschi, 1773-1846, an Italian physician and botanist, although there is some uncertainty about this. The name aethiopica is not directly related to Ethiopia. In classical times it meant south of the known world i.e. south of Egypt and Libya. Although called the arum lily, it is neither an arum (the genus Arum) nor a lily (genus Lilium). According to Marloth, the whiteness of the spathe is not caused by pigmentation, but is an optical effect produced by numerous airspaces beneath the epidermis. The white arum forms large colonies in marshy areas ranging from the coast to an altitude of 2250m. Thus one will find them contending with humid, salt laden air at the coast and freezing, misty mountain grasslands at high altitudes.

These arums were planted in my mother’s garden, then in our Camps Bay garden, then in one litre yoghurt containers for this second garden. Now, they are living in Apple creek and making gorgeous flowers. To the Ungardener they say funerals in the European tradition, to me they say winter rain, spring flowers, the epitome of beauty, and to our working locals they are just pig fodder.

Lighten our darkness

we beseech thee, O lord

There is nothing quite like the impact of, even a single, white arum flower in a garden. The leaves have a uniquely graceful, heart, spearhead shape – which also lends itself to using in a large vase.

Green Goddess

I did fall for Green Goddess. And I have a spotted leaf, which is more the summer blooming variety, but hasn’t made any flowers yet. These two are in Plum Creek.

And then there are the weird new hybrids – like this dark purply-brown one, or red or pink or yellow (pentlandii is deciduous, summer rainfall, yellow; and rehmanii is perennial usually pink – both from the Transvaal, up north). I dunno, an arum is white, it should be white, that is what makes it an arum, not just any old lily.

Italian arum at Klein Optenhorst

This beautiful leaf is an Italian arum, seen at Klein Optenhorst garden in Wellington, which is opened in spring and autumn.

Outside Porterville, arums and Melianthus

When we drive around the countryside now, we see drifts and swathes and clumps of arums, wherever there are streams and seeps and damp hollows. Nature uses arums to tell the gardener, it is damp here. In your garden, you can choose to plant it in shallow water, or water it regularly year round, then it will keep its leaves. Or you can let it flourish in the wet, winter season and fade away in the summer heat, as the wild ones do.

For me, this, arum lily, not a Protea or a Disa, is the Western Cape flower.

To a new reader

This blog is hosted at Blotanical 

It is a garden blog.

Alternate posts are about plants, in our garden, in the wild, or in farmer's fields.

Namaqualand's spring flowers. Open gardens. Fynbos after fire on our mountain.

Depending on how you have chosen to read this post, 

you may need to click thru to the blog

to see the poll on the sidebar. 

Question 1 has had 21 votes - THANK YOU ALL.

In February I will post feedback on comments, picks and the poll.

Photos by Jurg and Diana, 
written by Diana of  Elephant's Eye